My Optimism about the New Arab Revolt

Mr. Pipes is director of the Middle East Forum and Taube distinguished visiting fellow at the Hoover Institution of Stanford University.

Unprecedented convulsions across the Middle East, from Morocco to Iran, prompt three reflections:

First, these rebellions fit into the context of a regional chessboard, what I call the Middle East cold war. On one side stands the"resistance" bloc led by Iran and including Turkey, Syria, Lebanon, Gaza, and Qatar; it seeks to shake up the existing order with a new one, more piously Islamic and hostile to the West. On the other side stands the status quo bloc led by Saudi Arabia and including most of the rest of the region (implicitly including Israel); it prefers things to stay more or less as they are.

The former (but not Syria) have an agenda, the latter (except Israel) want primarily to enjoy the fruits of power. (Caged tigers, anyone? Or a private concert by Mariah Carey?) The former enjoy the appeal of offering a vision, the latter can deploy guns, lots of them.

Second, while developments in Tunisia, Libya, Egypt, Yemen, and Bahrain have great significance, there are only two regional geo-strategic giants – Iran and Saudi Arabia – and both are potentially vulnerable. Discontent with the Islamic Republic of Iran became manifest in June 2009, when a rigged election brought massive crowds onto the streets. Although the authorities managed to suppress the"Green Movement," they could not stifle it and it remains underground. Despite Tehran's strenuous efforts to lay claim to the revolts across the region, portraying them as inspired by the Iranian revolution of 1978-79 and its own brand of Islamism, these revolts more likely will inspire Iranians to renew their own assault on the Khomeinist order.

Were such a counter-revolution to succeed, the implications would go far beyond Iran, affecting the Non-Proliferation Treaty regime, Israeli security, Iraq's future, the global energy market, and – perhaps most critical of all – the Islamist movement itself. Bereft of the most important"resistance" government, the Islamist movement worldwide would likely begin to decline.

The Kingdom of Saudi Arabia is no ordinary state. Its power lies in a unique combination of Wahhabi doctrine, control over Mecca and Medina, and oil and gas reserves. In addition, its leaders boast an exceptional record of outside-the-box policies. Still, geographical, ideological, and personnel differences among Saudis could cause its fall; the key would then be to whom. Shi'ites who resent their second-class status and would presumably move the country towards Iran? Purist Wahhabis, who scorn the monarchical adaptations to modernity and would replicate the Taliban order in Afghanistan? Or both in the case of a split? Or perhaps liberals, hitherto a negligible force, who find their voice and lead an overthrow of the antiquated, corrupt, extremist Saudi order?

This latter thought leads to my third and most unexpected observation: The revolts over the past two months have been largely constructive, patriotic, and open in spirit. Political extremism of any sort, leftist or Islamist, has been largely absent from the streets. Conspiracy theories have been the refuge of decayed rulers, not exuberant crowds. The United States, Great Britain, and Israel have been conspicuously absent from the sloganeering. (Libyan strongman Mu'ammar al-Qaddafi blamed unrest in his country on Al-Qaeda spreading hallucinogenic drugs.)

One has the sense that the past century's extremism – tied to such figures at Amin al-Husseini, Gamal Abdel Nasser, Ruhollah Khomeini, Yasir Arafat, and Saddam Hussein – has run its course, that populations seek something more mundane and consumable than rhetoric, rejectionism, and backwardness.

Pessimism serves as a career enhancer in Middle East studies and I am known for doom-and-gloom. But, with due hesitation, I see changes that could augur a new era, one in which infantilized Arabic-speakers mature into adults. One rubs one's eyes at this transformation, awaiting its reversal. So far, however, it has held.

Perhaps the most genial symbol of this maturation is the pattern of street demonstrators cleaning up after themselves. No longer are they wards of the state dependent on it for services; of a sudden, they are citizens with a sense of civic responsibility.

While cautious about premising foreign policies on this abrupt improvement, it would also be a mistake to reject it. The rebel movements need an opportunity to find themselves and to act as adults. Time has come to discard the soft bigotry of low expectations; speaking Arabic or Persian does not make one incapable of building democratic means to attain free ends.

james joseph butler -
3/17/2011

Racism, join the club. Of course the Palestinians are racists so are the Israelis. I've never met anyone who isn't racist it's a matter of degree. Palestinians and Jews are Semites, they're the same race, religion sucks.

Your "FACTS", AE I know it's a cliche but why did you feel compelled to cap facts? Surveys state that this is a leading indicator of either insanity or a feeble brain.

"Case closed". Arthur you are the man.

arthur m. eckstein -
3/16/2011

It's not "dirtbombs": my FACTS are better than yours, Mr. Butler. And you offer no counter-arguments to why I concluded "case closed," just that you don't agree but you won't say why.

Mr. Butler, I notice also that you still won't deal with the Nazi-like genocidal racism I showed from Hamas and Qaradawi. I thought you were concerned about racism--so concerned that you search out any subtle Israeli racism you can find or think you have found. This is my third request for a comment on the Nazi genocidal racism of Hamas and Qaradawi. So far--silence.

james joseph butler -
3/16/2011

AE, 1)regarding your "case closed", there may be a dozen people who read this stuff and have opinions which they keep to themselves rather than this page. Feel free to influence the jury and Yahweh, I'm sure he's your friend.

2)Eire and Israel. Kiss me I'm an anti-imperialist. I could not care less about Ireland's laws or ............

Transferrence; when you're angry about one thing and you take it out on something, someone, else.

arthur m. eckstein -
3/14/2011

1. Mr. Butler, when I make a mistake I admit it too. But I didn't make any mistake here.

You wrote: "Neither Omar nor myself made any allusions to the US, Mexico, or Brazil, within the context of this thread."

But right above This claim, on March 11, 2011 at 6:12 p.m, you wrote the following:

"I have to agree with Omar regarding the significance(Otherwise why draw parallels as they both do.)of the concession that Israel has much in common with other colonial enterprises, be they; Mexico, Brazil, Canada, or the US. Gentlemen, when you concede that Israel is included within this set, which you do when you make comparisons within this set, you beg further comparsion...

Mexico, Brazil, Canada, USA, do not have racist laws incorporated within their constitutions. Israel does not have a constitution because it can't handle its own truth: Jews are entitled."

Case closed. It doesn't matter who brought in the comparison in first, because that wasn't your claim, that you didn't bring in the comparison first. Your claim was: "neither Omar nor I made any allusion, etc."--but you did, and emphatically!

2. Mr. Butler, it doesn't matter what you might or might not do once you get to Ireland. The issue is what Irish LAW is, what the Irish law of return is. And on this subject, Irish law is the same as Israeli law. And Irish and Israeli law here are the same as French, German, Polish, Czech, Chinese (both PRC and Taiwan!) and Greek law, and the same as the law in many other countries as well.

So your seeking for some sort of special "racism" in the Israeli law of return fails.

3. Mirror image: is Israel really the mirror of Nazi Germany? Did Jews vote, hold office, sit in Parliament and in the Cabinet in Nazi Germany? Could blacks do this in South Africa? But Arab Israelis do all these things.

4. What IS unparalleled--except in Nazi Germany--is the Nazi-like genocidal racism of Hamas and Qaradawi. On that you, the searcher for subtle Israeli racism, evidently have no comment.

I am glad you cite the terrible incident of last weekend. I oppose the West Bank settlements. But in the sink-hole of hatred, who is intentionally killing civilians and making genocidal statements of purpose, sir? What happened to that family, including the intentional murder of three children was the concrete actualization of Qaradawi's prayers to God. Don't you get the picture?

5. Once you do get that picture, I don't think you can have a defensible intellectual position which consists alternatively of (a) condemnation of Israel as subtly "racist" while ignoring the genocidal racism preached and acted out by the other side, and then (b) sighs of "can't we all just get along?".

james joseph butler -
3/14/2011

Mr Eckstein, when I make a mistake I admit it. I admitted I made a mistake regarding my misattribution of "a land without a people..." to Golda Meir, I found equally damning quotes, "there were no Palestinians". The point is; be a man, admit you made a mistake by stating that jjb was the first one to conflate Israel with "Brazil, Mexico...". Instead you respond with, "It doesn't matter whether NF brought it in," Bull. It is the crux of the matter. AE,#147676, "the fact is that you claimed you weren't involving these other national examples in discussion". Mr Prof. don't paraphrase me, quote me, if you want to make a point.

You don't quote me because my point was that as long as NF was conflating and comparing Israel to Brazil Mexico the the US I would happy to take up the comparasion. AE, "In contrast to the US or Brazil," yeah that's you on 3/10, and you have the chutzpah or the "Duh, heh I'm a busy guy." brainless balls to think I'm not gonna do due diligence for 5 minutes and point out the fact both you and NF didn't hesitate to comingle Israel with its brothers in colonialism on March 10th, I didn't do the same until March 11th.

I guess that was your 1. Regarding your 2. and the "law of return", I've said it before, the day I go to Ireland, my grandparents were born there, and expect something more than Hello, Thank You, and Goodbye, I'm an either an idiot or an imperialist.

3. Regarding my searching for, "subtle Israel racism"; "What we have here is a failure to communicate", I imagine you're familiar with that phrase, to be clear I believe that Israel was created because of the noxious racism, aka anti-semitism, of generations of goyim. Israel in turn created itself as a mirror image of the racism that Jews experienced through the ages. The quintessential human tragedy, this past weekend's hideous attack on a sleeping family and the ordinary Israeli response, more settlements, is just another illustration of this sinkhole of hatred. Or the holy land.

art eckstein -
3/13/2011

1. It doesn't matter whether NF brought it in, the fact is that you claimed you weren't involving these other national examples in discussion ("neither Omar nor I made any allusions to the U.S., Mexico or Brazil within the context of this thread")--when you had just done so emphatically. So you look foolish. That's not the fault of either NF or myself.

2. As for the "law of return": the same basic law exists in Germany, Poland, Ireland, China, France, the Czech Republic (to which Germans expelled in 1945 cannot return, btw), Greece, and numerous other countries. Look'em up, and learn something. Israel is, in other words, not unique--and therefore the whole issue is a red herring.

Your problem, Mr. Butler, is that you have blinkered ideas but don't know much information.

3. And, Butler--since you're always raising the "anti-racist" flag and searching for subtle Israeli "racism", do you really have nothing to say about the absolutely horrifying, genocidal and Nazi-like racist statements I quoted from Hamas spokesmen and al-Qaradawi?

james joseph butler -
3/13/2011

Marvels of synchroncity, we gasp we cheer, they vanquish the Iron Sheik again. Hooray Israel, Hooray America. Art Eckstein and N Friedman ride again. Yippee! Arthur's beautiful bride says he needs to be kind to the fish in the barrel, "Sweetie, next time, shoot 'em between the eyes, it's what the divine needs to do."

Arthur, Omar often uses "Professor" as bait. I'm gonna take a leap, believe him and ask why a professor doesn't do his research? Surely a doctor with the computing power to explain "secular" Israel's "law of return" can do due diligence and explain why he states:#147663, "Just above he writes: 'Neither Omar nor myself made any allusion to the US, Mexico, Brazil, within the context of this thread.'

Really? Just TWO entries above his own latest one (3/11/2011 at 6:12 PM)". I,JJB,#147625, write about the significance of the conflation by Mr Friedman,#147626, no it's not you Mr Eckstein, of Israel with, "Brazil, Mexico, Canada and the USA."

AE, long story short, you state that I first conflated Israel and its colonial brethren. Pay Attention. Do due diligence like a professor should. Or at least pay attention to the students who pay your salary. I wrote about, Tordesillas, Sykes-Picot, and the Berlin Conference, in #147625. NF responded,#147626, with "Brazil, Venezula, Mexico, Canada, and the US".

Point being, Arthur Eckstein, Mr Friedman, said it before me or you. Israel swims in the same Venn Diagram as its colonial sisters.

art eckstein -
3/12/2011

Sheikh Yusuf al-Qaradawi, on al-Jazeera, Jan. 26, 2009:

"Throughout history, Allah has imposed upon the Jews people who would punish them for their corruption...The last punishment was carried out by [Adolf] Hitler. By means of all the things he did to them – even though they exaggerated this issue – he managed to put them in their place. This was divine punishment for them...Allah willing, the next time will be at the hand of the believers."

That's right, Butler: Qaradawi, with his huge Muslim following (40 million listen to his radio show, he spoke to a crowd of a million in Egypt a month ago), is explicitly praying here that the Muslims will be allowed to finish Hitler's work!

Concerned about genocidal racism?

art eckstein -
3/12/2011

Mr. Butler, as someone who voted for Barack Obama and gave money to his campaign, I am personally glad to see you're so concerned about racism.

So try this on for size, then:

Mahmoud Al-Zahar, founder of Hamas said in 2007: “There is no place for you Jews among us, and you have no future among the nations of the world. You are headed to annihilation.”

In that same year, Ahmad Bahar, Acting Chairman of Gaza Parliament said:

“Be certain that America is on its way to disappear,… Allah, take hold of the Jews and their allies…Allah, count them and kill them to the last one and don’t leave even one.”

It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to know who these people are, Butler. They are genocidal racists, and totally explicit--indeed insistent--about it.

Care to comment?

art eckstein -
3/12/2011

An example of Mr. Butler at work:
Just above, he writes: "Neither Omar nor myself made any allusions to the US, Mexico, or Brazil, within the context of this thread."

Really? Just TWO entries above his own latest one (March 11, 2011 at 6:12 p.m.), Butler writes the following:

"I have to agree with Omar regarding the significance(Otherwise why draw parallels as they both do.)of the concession that Israel has much in common with other colonial enterprises, be they; Mexico, Brazil, Canada, or the US. Gentlemen, when you concede that Israel is included within this set, which you do when you make comparisons within this set, you beg further comparsion...

Mexico, Brazil, Canada, USA, do not have racist laws incorporated within their constitutions. Israel does not have a constitution because it can't handle its own truth: Jews are entitled."

Butler, I know you don't read carefully what I write--you've proven that many times; but don't you read what you yourself write?

My wife says my one failing is that I enjoy shooting fish in a barrel.

james joseph butler -
3/12/2011

Neither Omar nor myself made any allusions to the US, Mexico, or Brazil, within the context of this thread. I've made numerous comparasions between Israel and America in previous posts. I live in America, less than two miles away from a plaque that states the truth that white people were interlopers. The fact that America stole it's way to the top is both widely accepted and invisible.

Not that anyone actually listens here but I used "paradigm shift", see NYT flying ashtrays, to suggest that Israel will not and can not be judged as its colonial antecedents were.

If this was 1888 Israel might have a case but it's not. The sooner Israel realizes that the rules have changed and the past models that the learned gentlemen here assidously recite have expired the better off Israel will be, America too.

Of course this won't happen soon because ignorance is bliss or at least familiar. Israel is a helluva like America in the ME, a really slow learner, but they will learn, albeit painfully for all concerned.

art eckstein -
3/12/2011

And of course it's not only Jews who were expelled by Arab National Socialist governments:

300,000 Greeks were expelled from Egypt in 1957 by the Nasser govt--a classic case of ethnic and religious cleansing; some families had lived in Egypt for 2300 years.

Meanwhile, tens of thousands of Christians are fleeing in fear from Lebanon today because of the victory of Omar's friends Hezbollah--another topic of indifference to Omar. Or do you deny it, Omar?

Omar, look in the mirror.

N. Friedman -
3/12/2011

Omar,

What you write is simply untrue.

omar ibrahim baker -
3/12/2011

Prof
NOT a single Jew was EXPELLED from an ARAB coutry.
Those who left did so VOLUNTARILY and left through PASSPORT CONTROL and CUSTOMS; the poor to occupied Palestine and the rich to Europe and the USA.
AS a matter of historical TRUTH and unchallengeable FACT the then nascent intelligence service of Israel did actually coerce them to leave by staging "Terrorist" attacks on Jewish properties and synagogues in Arab countries.( THe LAVON affair in Egypt).

WE have been here before and both you and N Friedman failed to bring out any evidence of official Arab pressures on Jews to leave.
You know that but pretend NOT to.

art eckstein -
3/12/2011

Butler--what "Messianic cult"? Israel is secular. (Maybe you mean al-Qaeda, or Hamas, or Hezbollah?) And what "grandiosity"? Israel is just trying to survive.

And Butler--is your position then not only "U.S. out of Iraq!", and "U.S. out of Afghanitan!", but "U.S. out of North America?"

Not to mention "Mexico out of Central America?" And "Brazil out of South America"?

In any case, Israel is different from the U.S. since (to repeat), all land owned by the proto-Israelis before 1947/1948 was BOUGHT from WILLING Arab sellers; and the rest of pre-1967 Israel is the result of Israel being ATTACKED. Omar's people started the war but he just can't stop whining because they lost, even though the ultimate result was more Middle-Eastern Jews turned into refugees than Palestinians. Nothing parallel here to the U.S., Mexico, or Brazil there.

james joseph butler -
3/11/2011

I have to agree with Omar regarding the significance(Otherwise why draw parallels as they both do.)of the concession that Israel has much in common with other colonial enterprises, be they; Mexico, Brazil, Canada, or the US. Gentlemen, when you concede that Israel is included within this set, which you do when you make comparisons within this set, you beg further comparsion.

And I have to agree, history and the rest of the world, the General Assembly and the Security Council are not judging Israel fairly. All judgements are temporal. The conditions on the planet have changed. Justice is not Talmudic it's holistic. I agree with y'all Israel is sui generis, as far as colonies go, some of you, a distinct minority, were there a long time. But the problems that Israel experiences today revolve around its own grandiosity. As long as it embodies a messianic cult, little different from Al-Queda in its sense of supernatural sponsorship, it will fail to grasp the opportunity to live in peace and harmony.

Mexico, Brazil, Canada, USA, do not have racist laws incorporated within their constitutions. Israel does not have a constitution because it can't handle its own truth: Jews are entitled.

The aforementioned colony nations have exterminated/integrated its indigenous peoples better than Israel has. Israel is still deciding which choice would behoove it and then there's that 21st century thing about ethnic cleansing.

art eckstein -
3/11/2011

Arabs were displaced by the war of 1947-1948 and its aftermath--but that happened to JEWS as well, both during the war (e.g., the ethnic cleansing of the Old City and the Etzion Bloc--including at Etzion the massacre of 250 civilians who had surrendered) and afterward, when 850,000 Jews expelled from Arab lands. The latter figure is 100,000 MORE victims than the Naqbah, Omar. Where are your cries of outrage at 100,000 MORE victims than those displaced in the Naqbah, Omar? They will not come.

It also means that half the current Jewish population of Israel are not "settlers from Europe" but MIDDLE-EASTERN--MIDDLE EASTERN REFUGEES--IN ORIGIN.

To be sure, those Middle Eastern refugees have been treated far better by their kinfolk in Israel than the Palestinians have been treated by their kinfolk, especially in Lebanon. Are you going to blame the Jews for that as well, because you simply cannot look honestly in the mirror?

omar ibrahim baker -
3/11/2011

N
Do you or do you NOT see, perceive, fathom and digest an intrinsic contradiction , a self negation, of your earlier defense of Jewish emigration into Palestine as a "human right" and the fact, as you belatedly concur, that " , the fact is that Arabs were displaced " ??

Your ability to juggle morality to preserve a pseudo liberal aura, and defend an indefensible doctrine, is simply astounding.
However I guess it does not fool anybody that follows your acrobatic logic and your cultural multi faceted, multipurpose and passe par tous standards .( A, different, morality for each season.)
You are being progressively Ecksteined...that is, never the less, sad but, of course, inevitable.

N. Friedman -
3/11/2011

Arnold,

In order to have a conversation, it is often necessary, in asking questions, to assume the theory of the party questioned. I have done that here.

However, the fact is that Arabs were displaced. I do not deny that. I do not accept the theory - on at least factual grounds - as to the cause of the displacements and their moral significance.

Arnold Shcherban -
3/11/2011

Norm,
With American Indians example you really blew it and severely injured your arguments, buddy...
American Indians were FORCED (through essential physical genocide and removal from their native lands) by white Americans, mostly of European decent, to accept the inferior status in all aspects, and even today have as much real power and voice to reclaim their lands, as you to own the entire New York City.
By drawing close analogy between them
and Palestinians, aren't you admitting the main point of Omar's comments: Palestinians were physically
eliminated and/or forced out from their native lands by Israelis, also mostly of European decent?

N. Friedman -
3/11/2011

Omar,

All over the world, migration, displacement, claims on land have changed over and over again.

You claim that 14 centuries makes the Arab claim permanent. If the Jews hold the land Jews call Israel for 14 centuries, will that claim be permanent?

To be frank, what I think is that you are taking an ad hoc position that Arab conquests are permanent because that is the result you like.

By contrast, those, other than American Indians, who settled what is now the US, do not have a claim of 14 centuries. The claim runs back only a few centuries and the conquest of the American Indians is more recent still. It was still going on into the late 19th Century. American Indians - or at least a number of them - do not take these conquests as permanent. Do you take them as permanent? If so, why are they legitimate?

omar ibrahim baker -
3/11/2011

The learned Professor at a USA University of the 21st century has this jewel to share with us all:
"But Omar--your claims about the Palestinians' ancestral rights are based on sheer conquest "

Possibly but CERTAINLY that was some 14 (Fourteen) centuries ago, ie 1400 years ago Prof.

Do not you see that things have changed since and HUMANKIND progressed from the era of "Stronger tribe displaces weaker tribe to control the better pastures"??

ARE you,Prof,aware or unaware of the Progress of HUMANITY into the era of SELF DETERMINATIONand anti conquest and anti colonization ??

What are you telling your students about human progress: that it still allows ,condones and glorifies conquest and colonization??
Is that what you tell your students PROF!

N. Friedman -
3/11/2011

Omar,

I admitted nothing. I accepted, for purposes of responding to James, his construct. That is simpler than posing the same question that using language that I think more accurate

N. Friedman -
3/11/2011

Omar,

See Art's response. You have not addressed the point. Presumably, you have no answer.

Again, among the property you claim to be Arab land is land that was not Arab land.

I might ask, how does land become Arab land? Can Arab land ever cease being Arab land?

art eckstein -
3/11/2011

No, Omar--Virginians and Texans IDENTIFIED themselves always as Virginians and Texans. The Arabs of Palestine IDENTIFIED THEMSELVES AS SYRIANS. Get the difference? Duh.

Hence the first anti-British and anti-Jewish riots by Arabs in the Mandate in 1921 had to do with the SEPARATION of the Mandate region from Syria. THIS was the original meaning of the term "Nakbah."

art eckstein -
3/11/2011

But Omar--your claims about the Palestinians' ancestral rights are based on sheer conquest on the basis of Allah's will. If you define "retrogressive" that way, then it's even more "retrogressive".

art eckstein -
3/11/2011

In other words: Omar has no answer to our specific facts, or to Mr. Friedman's specific question and keeps on citing distorted statistics from his propaganda-website instead.

omar ibrahim baker -
3/11/2011

Mr. N Friedman is making an important point here, admitting :
that Israel is as much the outcome of a colonialist enterprise as were Brazil, Mexico , the USA and Canada!

Without going into the minutiae of the issue the thing to note here is twofold:
a- that Mr. Friedman here consciously NEGATES and rejects human progress, which developed , inter alia, the principle of SELF DETERMINATION, the denunciation and rejection of colonialism etc
AND
b- he, Mr. Friedman,IS for , accepts and condones, the application of 16 and 17 century practices of conquest, colonization etc in the 20th Century.

Which admissions’, coming from the more sober of Zionists here, confirms Israel's RETROGRESSIVE as much as its RACIST and COLONIALIST nature!

That is exactly what we have been saying all along!

omar ibrahim baker -
3/11/2011

With the Prof one must always go back to 1+1=2!
He scholarlily declares :
" Omar, the Palestinians were merely southern Syrians until the 1920s "
(Re: Pipes is Right! (#147605)
by arthur m eckstein on March 9, 2011 at 1:51 PM )
AND the Virginians and Texans were/are always South American ( re the USA) geographical position and the Bavarians were/are South German !
So WHAT ??
How does that, living in certain geographical location, change facts ??
A course in 1=1= 2 is badly needed for the Prof!

omar ibrahim baker -
3/11/2011

N
Your "much" is a nonentity in that it means nothing when juxtaposed with British precise figures that indicate 94.22% ARAB OWNED versus 5.8% Jewish owned.
Also to note that the Greek Orthodox church had among its adherents "much" more Palestinian Arabs ( The majority of Arab Palestinian Christians ) than Jews....NO??

arthur m eckstein -
3/10/2011

Butler, in contrast to the history of the U.S. or Brazil, every piece of land within the pre-1967 borders of Israel was either (a) bought outright from willing Arab sellers, or (b) was the result of a war in which the proto-Israelis were attacked (not the attackers). How is that "theft", or whatever?

As for the West Bank, I am opposed to the Jewish settlements there, and have said so repeatedly.

But...Since the Israeli Supreme Court ruled in 1979 in Dwaikat v. Israel that settlements could not be on confiscated Palestinian private property, all legal settlements have been on land that was previously owned by the Jordanian State.

That doesn't make the settlements a good idea. They aren't.

But it does mean that the vast majority of the land in use in the settlements was not previously owned by private Palestinians but by the Government of Jordan--who lost it after Jordan attacked Israel in 1967.

If Israel is or becomes a pariah, it will only show the victory of historical ignorance-- of which you, sir, are a prime example.

N. Friedman -
3/10/2011

James,

It might be asked, since you think that colonial ventures are all passe, whether you apply that to countries like Brazil, Venezuela, Mexico, Canada and the US. If not, why not?

For the record, if these countries (or any of them) is ok, how do they, on your theory, differ from Israel?

james joseph butler -
3/10/2011

This conversation is simple: If Golda, AE, and NF, agree that blue is black, black is blue. There are numerous precedents throughout history; Tordesillas 1494, Berlin Conference 1894, Sykes-Picot 1916, honorable men sought to "administer government among savage and senile peoples." U.S. senator Thomas Beveridge praising his nation's effort in the Phillipines.

What AE, NF, and Golda seem blithely unaware of is the fact that history moves on,the paradigm shift on colonialism renders Israel a 21st century pariah everywhere but the USA. Someday the logic of the dollar will displace the logic of the Book. Who knows maybe justice might visit the Holy Land.

N. Friedman -
3/10/2011

Omar,

Have you read a thing that Art wrote? His point is that much of what you call "Arab land" was not Arab land.

Land owned by the GREEK Orthodox Church is not ARAB land. Land owned by the OTTOMAN authorities (later, the British Empire) was not ARAB land.

Have you a stitch of evidence that land owned by, for example, the GREEK Orthodox Church, is ARAB land? If not, your statement is simply false.

omar ibrahim baker -
3/10/2011

Prof
You fail to see the most important point that Arab land ownwership was 94.22% versus 5.8% Jewish.
That is almost 19 fold!!!
Look up the more detailed British data and tell US what you get.
Promise!!!

art eckstein -
3/10/2011

Omar: this listing, which you have brought here many times before, does not distinguish between private and state-owned land, which is exactly my point.

In this particular propaganda listing listing from a propaganda site, the state-owned land is classified as "Arab"-owned; but under the terms of the Mandate it was first owned by the Ottoman State (not Arabs), which is why it is state-owned land, then overseen by the British administration.

Church land too must in this propaganda listing you like to tout be classified as "Arab owned"; but the Greek Orthodox Church is even today the largest land-owner in Israel--and they are not Arab. Even the Israeli Knesset building sits on land leased from the Greek Orthodox Church (there's an annual rent).

Roads, railways, rivers, and lakes 135,803
Total Area including roads, railways, etc.
26,320,505

Source: A Survey of Palestine prepared by the British Mandate for the UN, p. 566.

Related Important links
View the scanned page from which the above data were extracted.
More tabular data about Jewish land ownership per district as of 1946.
Village Statistics Project: The MOST detailed study for every Palestinian and Jewish town in Palestine before Nakba, includes all sorts of data you can imagine: landownership, population, land usage, education, ...etc.
Interactive map showing the theft of Palestinian people's lands by successive Israeli governments

Source: A Survey of Palestine prepared by the British Mandate for the UN, p. 566.

Related Important links
View the scanned page from which the above data were extracted.
More tabular data about Jewish land ownership per district as of 1946.
Village Statistics Project: The MOST detailed study for every Palestinian and Jewish town in Palestine before Nakba, includes all sorts of data you can imagine: landownership, population, land usage, education, ...etc.
Interactive map showing the theft of Palestinian people's lands by successive Israeli governments

art eckstein -
3/10/2011

Much of the Mandate was state-owned land (thanks to Ottoman heritage), or church-owned land. Even today the largest landowner in Israel... is the Greek Orthodox Church (Time Magazine, May 29, 2005).

Omar the Ignorant assumes that all land not owned by Jews was owned by Arabs. It's just not the case. It's a lot more complicated. But ignorance serves to fuel his hatred.

In any case, if Omar is now finally admitting that all land owned by Jews in 1947 had been voluntarily sold to them by willing Arab sellers, than a good part of his continual accusations of about "theft, stolen land" goes out the window. Not all--but a good part, right out the window.

As for the rest, the pre-1967 borders were the result of a war which the Arabs, led by the genocidal maniac Amin al-Husseini, started. They were winning for five months, but then they lost. There were consequences. Now, the losers in a war they started, they never cease whining about that situation. It's shameful behavior.

As for the West Bank, I am opposed to the Jewish settlements there, and have said so repeatedly.

But...Since the Israeli Supreme Court ruled in 1979 in Dwaikat v. Israel that settlements could not be on confiscated Palestinian private property, all legal settlements have been--again--on land that was previously owned by the Jordanian State.

That doesn't make the settlements a good idea. They aren't.

But it does mean that the vast majority of the land in use in the settlements was not previously owned by private Palestinians but by the Government of Jordan--who lost it after Jordan attacked Israel in 1967.

omar ibrahim baker -
3/10/2011

Prof
Let me remind you of the facts that you have ignored:

PALESTINE LAND OWNERSHIP:
" 1. Omar, nothing was stolen. Every piece of land owned by Jews in the Mandate in 1947 was sold to them by willing Arab sellers, often small-holders. " you declaim.
Which is a tautology (the equivalent of: every car I own was bought from a car dealer!) BUT that is totally unrelated to the relevant basic question of : " how much of Palestine did Jews own in 1948"; which is the pertinent question!
The answer to that is, according to British figures, 5.6% (+/-) of the total area of Palestine.
This 5.6% should be juxtapose with the irrefutable facts that :
a- Israel's land allocation according to the UNGA Partition of Palestine was 56% (+/-) of the total area of Palestine
And
b-Israel established itself in 1948 over some 72% (+/-) of the total area of Palestine .
Going by the Prof's own words the inevitable conclusions are:
1-Jews owned only some 10% (5.6/56) of the land allocated to Israel's by the UNGA PPR and the balance of 90% (+/-) was NOT owned by Jews ie was Arab, mainly, and others owned and was stolen from them.
AND
2-Israel was established over a land out of which Jews owned ONLY 7.7% (5.6/72) and over 92.3 % ( 100-7.7=92.3%) Jews did NOT OWN, the balance being stolen from its mainly Arab owners.

THE HAJJ AMIN HUSSEINI NAZI ISSUE:
Here the Prof reiterates the innate allegations of a doctrinaire Nazi Palestinian leadership deliberately ignoring that most basic rules of politics and FACTS of temporary history that the enemy of my enemy is my friend and ally while the battle rages.
The Prof resents the HajjAmin/Germany (then Nazi ruled) relations choosing to forget, ignore and accept that :
a- Israel heartily and willingly accepted a great deal of money and political support from GERMANY, the nation that at one time gave Nazism and Hitler its majority support!
( One would expect from a good father NOT to accept money from the killer of his children!)

b-At one time some 50% (+/-), land and people, of FRANCE had extremely close and friendly relations with NAZI Germany and Hitler (The Vichy regime).
c-At one time all of Italy, under Mussolini, was extremely friendly with and a military ally of Nazi Germany and Hitler.

To the Prof GERMAN/FRENCH/ITALIAN--NAZI/Hitler relations are not ONLY acceptable and understandable as politically motivated BUT are
” pardonable”, being financially and politically EXPLOITABLE , while the much less close Palestinian Leadership-Nazi/Hitler relations are NOT!

Here it is not a question of a DOUBLE standard as much as it is the SINGLE Zionist standard of incessant total immorality, morality less, profitability and the end justifies the means"

omar ibrahim baker -
3/10/2011

Prof
That is NOT GENOCIDE ; its proper name is "National Liberation" just like Algeria and South Africa, of Apartheid, were liberated from ALIENS' colonization.
You should be able to see the difference.

arthur m eckstein -
3/9/2011

Omar, the Palestinians were merely southern Syrians until the 1920s. That is how they identified themselves. The Naqbah originally meant the DIVISION of the Arabs of the Mandate from Syria. The first great anti-British (and anti-Jewish) riot by Arabs, in 1921, was to protest the creation of an entity SEPARATE from Syria. They identified themselves as Syrians.

You don't seem to understand this. As for "the land", the Arabs of the Mandate sold to the proto-Israelis every piece of land the proto-Israelis owned in 1947. The rest of pre-1967 Israel was the result of a war which the people we now call the Palestinians started, and lost--and now you whine about it as an injustice. (Again, in the 1940s, it was the proto- Israelis who had the name "Palestinians.")

N. Friedman -
3/9/2011

Omar,

In other words, you reject the rights of immigrants to find refuge where it is available. That is shameful.

N. Friedman -
3/9/2011

Omar,

Actually, what you describe are acts of genocide. According to the Genocide Convention:

Article II: In the present Convention, genocide means any of the following acts committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group, as such:

(a) Killing members of the group;
(b) Causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group;
(c) Deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part;
(d) Imposing measures intended to prevent births within the group;
(e) Forcibly transferring children of the group to another group.

You openly seek to deprive the Jews of their homeland. Such could only be accomplished by force which would involve killing people. And, since you take the presence of ALIEN Jews as illegitimate, your intention would be to destroy them as a group. That is called genocide.

Hamas, of course, is even blunter than you. It claims its purpose as to rid the world of Jews. That, of course, was the object of the Nazi lover, advocate and leader of the Arabs of Palestine, Hajj Amin al-Husseini, who said such repeatedly.

omar ibrahim baker -
3/9/2011

Pakistan, Bengaladesh & Sri Lanka etc may be, in a way are, "a modern construct" when it comes to "name","appelation" but when it comes to the reality of a people residing a certain land and owning it , none is JUST LIKE THE PALESTINIANS IN PALESTINE!

What ever you care to call them the 80 % of the population of the land we all cal Palestine was, up to 1918, Arab, both Moslem and Christia, and NOT Jews; those were then slightly less tha 10%

Prof be more careful with your words...you are slipping...badly!

It is adults you are facing here NOT captive students!

omar ibrahim baker -
3/9/2011

"You inquire:"What one does to those with an "AGGRESSIVE, RACIST and MARAUDING" doctrine,"??
My answer is :
-Deprive them of their ill gained loot and of the fruits, the rewards, of their plunder
AND-Liberate his homeland from them
AND-Return the loot and plunder to its rightful owners"

NONE of that is GENOCIDE, Prof!

art eckstein -
3/9/2011

As for genocide in Muslim thinking demeaning the perpetrator--Omar, maybe you better take that issue up with Sheikh al-Qaradawi, the most important intellectual figure in the Muslim world at the moment. He believes that even Israeli women, babies, and old people are legitimate targets. That's what he told the BBC in 2005. That's the definition of genocide.

art eckstein -
3/9/2011

The quote you cite from Golda Meier does not contain the phrase you wish. Didn't you notice? In any case, this phrase was used by Christians, and not by many Zionists. That's a fact you can't escape.

Golda M is perfectly correct that there was no such people as the Palestinians before the Mandate, Butler--they thought of themselves as southern SYRIANS. The original term "Nakbah", as used in the 1920s, refers to the separation of the Mandate region from Syria, which the Arabs living in the Mandate considered a disaster, and unnatural. Get it?

The "Palestinians" are a modern construct, a modern post-1920 invention. Under the Ottomans (400 years of foreign rule, as opposed to 20 under the British, by the way) there was no such district as "Palestine." Never. Parts of what became the Mandate was ruled from Damascus under that name, part was ruled from Beirut under that name, and there was also a small separate administrative district for Jerusalem--which was majority Jewish.

In the 1940s, the term "Palestinian" actually mean the proto-Israelis.

In 1921, the British dug up the name Palestine because post 300 A.D. it was the insulting Roman name for Judaea (Philistines, get it?), and the British liked to fancy themselves the heirs of Rome.

Of course, there's certainly a Palestinian people NOW--just as there is an Israeli people NOW. The specific modern identities of these two peoples developed in the same cauldron, though the Israelis had a 4000 year history to go along with it.

Sorry to make the history too complicated for you. I know it makes it difficult for you to udnerstand.

N. Friedman -
3/9/2011

Omar,

I do not think you use the words in their usual sense. I think you use them as essential categories. Otherwise, anyone born in the country could not be an alien. Such a person is native.

omar ibrahim baker -
3/9/2011

N
Weak, meager and inane response to a conclusive, rare, admission of how Israel came to be and what Israel really IS; as declaimed by the
”learned“ Professor Eckstein no less at a rare mood of acknowledgement of facts!

You inquire:"What one does to those with an "AGGRESSIVE, RACIST and MARAUDING" doctrine,"??
My answer is :
-Deprive them of their ill gained loot and of the fruits, the rewards, of their plunder
AND-Liberate his homeland from them
AND-Return the loot and plunder to its rightful owners

Re your failed attempt to brush away the, rare, truth that came from the Professor:
Your contention that ALIENS, the appropriate term I use to describe all NON INDIGEMOUS JEWS, residing in Palestine means to me, as you allege , "not human beings" is dishonest,fallacious and unfounded ; it is a deliberate dishonest misinterpretation of my words.
I use the term ALIEN in its proper context and proper meaning as defined by Webster:
" Synonyms: foreign, nonnative "
I do not need to distort the meaning of words to convey my message; as you , dishonestly, do when talking about "SHARE" when you mean conquer!

An enemy should be recognized and defined for what he really is; no amount of pseudo erudition, post act justification or regret , wisdom of hindsight and/or play on words will make those who DISPLACED, DISPOSSESSED,DISFRANCHISED and SUBJUGATED my people in our homeland anything other than ENEMIES, the exact term depicting them!
GENOCIDE is foreign, alien, to Arab and Moslem nature and culture as an unbiased reading of Arab history, replete as it is with conquests in times past, will show.
We believe it demeans its perpetrator as much as it punishes and/or hurts its victims.
GENOCIDE and ETHNIC CLEANSING are an integral part of your Judeo/Christian culture, psyche and HISTORY, NOT of ours.

james joseph butler -
3/8/2011

As always Arthur deepest appreciation for your punctilious attention to the truth. Such righteous devotion might make me wish I could I could inhale the same rare air as you, wait a second, I can.

You did the right thing unlike me who'd heard the "Land without a people"...quote before without recognizing its rich history, I attributed it to Golda because others had. AE you compelled me to seek the truth and I discovered an uncanny similarity between you and Wiki regarding your insights on the "land without a people" quote.
Ok Arthur, enough with the sources, that's a distraction. Prime Minister Meir doesn't channel 19th century Christian restorationists half as effectively as she does any half decent American lawyer. Who says school teachers aren't as smart as prime ministers?

PM. Meir, on what's a Palestinian anyway? Sunday Times/Washington Post June 15/16 1969: "There were no such things as Palestinians. When was there an independent Palestinian people with a Palestinian state? It was either southern Syria before the first World War, and then it a Palestine including Jordan. It was not as though there was a Palestinian people in Palestine considering itself a Palestinian people and we came in and threw them out and took their country away. They did not exist."

What can I say AE? You've done it again, your assiduous attention to your truth only brings me closer to my truth. Curious and obvious.

I'm fascinated with America before us Christians, Jews, and Muslims ruined it. Ok made it. PM Meir's response regarding those people who don't exist is the quiddity of racism, America, and Israel.

It was not as though there was a New York people in New York people considering itself a New York people.

Thank You Prime Minister. You've made yourself transparent. And Arthur darling so have you.

N. Friedman -
3/8/2011

Omar appears to be addicted to the language of genocide. Note his words, especially those in all capital letters.

What one does to those with an "AGGRESSIVE, RACIST and MARAUDING" doctrine, is kill them. The same for his other commonly used capital letter word, "ALIEN." Israeli Jews, on his telling, are ALIENS, not human beings. That, notwithstanding being essentially identical genetic material as he is.

By demonizing your enemies, Omar, you advance the notion of annihilating them. Or, in simple words, your vocabulary is the vocabulary of genocide, something which is the official position of groups like HAMAS.

james joseph butler -
3/7/2011

Douglas, I'm an anti-Zionist for the same reason that I'm an anti-colonialist: there were no lands without peoples, in 1492,or 1948. The notion that Palestine was a land without a people is the germ of Zionism as were all other racist colonialist enterprises. America is the paradigm of the successful racist colonialist state, the other germs were our foremost allies.

Not to bore you with my allusions to past sins, but the idea that "democracies" such as America, or the UK or France, can move forward in the ME without first doing penance, at the very least admitting the US's support of dictatorships from Iran to Iraq to Egypt, lacks understanding of much what motivates these democracy movements. The people taking it to the streets are tired of having their betters exploit both themselves, Mohamed Bouazizi, and their nations, see Egypt and Gaza. They know what you don't seem to know, that when Israel starves Gazans the state of Egypt is complicit, bought.

Prof Pipes is another brick in the wall that lies between America seeing the Middle East for what it is, why Al-Jazeera is banned, and the ME that Israel and AIPAC want us to see.

Al-Jazeera in all 50 states would do more to further democracy in the ME than all the F-18's, drones, Hillaries, and Xe's combined. Why? because Americans would see themselves in their Muslim brethren.

Arnold Shcherban -
3/7/2011

<...a Zionist and conservative like Profssor Pipes has endorsed the new Arab Spring.>
Let's see under which conditions he "endorsed" it.
That's what he begins with his evaluation of "the new Arab spring":
<On one side stands the "resistance" bloc led by Iran and including Turkey, Syria, Lebanon, Gaza, and Qatar; it seeks to shake up the existing order with a new one, more piously Islamic and hostile to the West.>
Just recently, before Gaza-Turkish flotilla incident, and in the course of the last two-three decades, the same Pipes, along with all Zionists and American conservatives, have been singing praises to Turkey for, allegedly, being virtually a single democracy in Muslim world and a good friend/ally of the US and Israel.
When Turkish governmental military forces (NATO members) were killing thousands of Kurds (they killed much more Kurds than Saddam Hussein's regime and on basically the same charge: as enemies of the nation and terrorists) neither US, nor Israel protested against or condemned that, essentially, ethnic cleansing. Also, for decades, Israel and US Zionist organizations along with non-Zionist conservatives (read - REACTIONARIES) declined to recognize Armenian genocide perpetrated by Turks, actually have done a lot of lobbying to defeat an official recognition of that mass-murder as a genocide.
But right after the Gaza flotilla accident the Turkey has transformed itself overnight from democracy and dear friend to the nation of Muslim fanatics, terrorists, and the enemy of democracy (read - ISRAEL.)
And so is every country/nation and every political leader who does not FULLY endorse the Israeli expansionist
policies becomes anti-democratic, socialist, secular or religious dictator, and every dictator who does the former becomes dear friend and just leader.
It happened to Mubarak, to Chaushesku whose totalitarian and murderous regime was provided with cash ($3000 a head) by Israeli Secret Service in exchange for Romanian Jews' emigration to Israel, even to any Washington's administration (the closest and most loyal friend of Israel), even if the latter would timidly and only rhetorically reluctant to endorse 10% of Israel actions and policies (in practice they have always endorsed 100% of those), taken in outright violation of the international laws and elementary justice. (Carter, Obama)
Read my lips, Douglas: Mr. Pipes and Co. will continue to "endorse" the revolt in ME, exactly until, say Egypt, will remain under (if not direct than effective) control of its military, which was as we all know an enabler and supporter of Mubarak's regime...
Thus, one has to be really blind to
not see the insidious nature of Pipes' endorsements.

Arnold Shcherban -
3/7/2011

<...a Zionist and conservative like Profssor Pipes has endorsed the new Arab Spring.>
Let's see under which conditions he "endorsed" it.
That's what he begins with his evaluation of "the new Arab spring":
<On one side stands the "resistance" bloc led by Iran and including Turkey, Syria, Lebanon, Gaza, and Qatar; it seeks to shake up the existing order with a new one, more piously Islamic and hostile to the West.>
Just recently, before Gaza-Turkish flotilla incident, and in the course of the last two-three decades, the same Pipes, along with all Zionists and American conservatives, have been singing praises to Turkey for, allegedly, being virtually a single democracy in Muslim world and a good friend/ally of the US and Israel.
When Turkish governmental military forces (NATO members) were killing thousands of Kurds (they killed much more Kurds than Saddam Hussein's regime and on basically the same charge: as enemies of the nation and terrorists) neither US, nor Israel protested against or condemned that, essentially, ethnic cleansing. Also, for decades, Israel and US Zionist organizations along with non-Zionist conservatives (read - REACTIONARIES) declined to recognize Armenian genocide perpetrated by Turks, actually have done a lot of lobbying to defeat an official recognition of that mass-murder as a genocide.
But right after the Gaza flotilla accident the Turkey has not only transformed itself overnight from democracy and dear friend to the nation of Muslim fanatics, terrorists, and the enemy of democracy (read - ISRAEL.), but all its past deadly sins (some of which I mentioned above) were suddenly "discovered" by Piped folks.
What a coincidence!?
And so is every country/nation and every political leader who does not FULLY endorse the Israeli expansionist
policies become anti-democratic, socialist one, secular or religious dictator, and every dictator who does the former becomes dear friend and just leader.
It happened to Mubarak, to Chaushesku whose totalitarian and murderous regime was provided with cash ($3000 a head) by Israeli Secret Service in exchange for Romanian Jews' emigration to Israel, even to any Washington's administration (the closest and most loyal friend of Israel), even if the latter would timidly and only rhetorically reluctant to endorse 10% of Israel actions and policies (in practice they have always endorsed 100% of those), taken in outright violation of the international laws and elementary justice (Carter, Obama.)

Read my lips, Douglas: Mr. Pipes and Co. will continue to "endorse" the revolt in ME, exactly until, say Egypt, will remain under (if not direct then effective) control of its military, which was as we all know an enabler and supporter of Mubarak's regime...
Thus, one has to be really blind to
not see the insidious nature of Pipes' endorsements.

Douglas Hainline -
3/7/2011

Two peoples want the same land. An old story, and both sides in this particular story cannot stop rehearsing their (true on both sides) grievances. I doubt that the anti-Zionists here even bothered to read what he said.

To me, the really interesting thing is that a Zionist and conservative like Profssor Pipes has endorsed the new Arab Spring.

The events in the Middle East have caused a real split among conservatives: some see it as the Ayatollah Khomeini come again, others see it as a vindication of the Bush Doctrine.

People who want to see democracy all over the world, and who believe that bloody national conflicts are best -- or least worst -- resolved by democracies on both sides, ought to welcome statements like those of Professor Pipes.

Now, let's start pressuring democratic governments to come to the aid of the democratic forces in the Arab world.

art eckstein -
3/7/2011

Ignorant Jimmy strikes again.

Although often assumed to have been a Zionist slogan, this phrase was in fact coined by a Christian Restorationist clergyman in 1843--ANTHONY ASHTON-COOPER-- and it continued to be fairly widely used for almost a century by Christian Restorationists. In the nineteenth and early twentieth century period in which this phrase was in common use, the Arab inhabitants of Palestine did not in their view constitute a coherent national group, "a people", and, therefore, Christian Restorationists argued that the "land of Israel" should be given to the Jewish people.

It is now thought by some scholars that this phrase never came into widespread use among Jewish Zionists. See: Diana Muir, Middle Eastern Quarterly, spring 2008.

Jimmy, why don't you read some serious scholarly history before posting your propaganda here on HNN?

art eckstein -
3/7/2011

You're historically wrong, Omar--read Benny Morris, 1948 (Yale University Press, 2008), pp. 191-196. Abdullah in fact wanted ALL of the Mandate--ALL of it--within his kingdom, and offered the proto-Israelis their own independent "republic" along the Partition lines within his projected expanded kingdom. He settled for occupying the West Bank and East Jerusalem.

Omar, you have no contrary evidence, all you can offer here is vituperation, which you apparently think is a good substitute for evidence. It isn't.

james joseph butler -
3/7/2011

La di da, believing in Israel requires a leap of faith. Such as, it's 1948, and there's, "a land without a people". -"Oh my God, dahling, look at this. It's a land with nobody home. Why not happiness? We deserve sunshine. What we've been through -"Assuredely."--

AE, was Golda Meir a liar when she stated that __________ was a land without a people?

omar ibrahim baker -
3/6/2011

The Prof declaims:
"That's where the 20% expansion comes from: because of the war. "
Which only proves my earlier contention that:
"However with an AGGRESSIVE, RACIST and MARAUDING doctrine, Zionism, the only valid and tenable “logic”, as with the logic of colonialism, is the “logic” of conquest, plunder and total denial of others’ rights which is ,in essence, the story of Israel "

The man, I mean the University Professor, can not follow up his own perverted "logic" !

omar ibrahim baker -
3/6/2011

Prof
Recent history,1967 onwards,proved beyond any shadow of doubt that it was neither King Abdullah I nor any his descedants that had "ambitions" over the rest of Palestine.
Still does with the unflagging support of the Ecksteins of this world, every day, if you do follow up the news!
Wth recent events still very fresh in everybody's mind you come up with such a "logic"....simply amazing!

art eckstein -
3/6/2011

Yes, Omar--and if the Palestinians had accepted the partition, set up their own state, and there'd been no war, there is no reason to think about "Israeli expansion". After all, it was the Israelis who were attacked in 1947, not vice versa.

You're simply whining, Omar, about the outcome of a war your side started. It's infantile.

Of course, whether such a 1948 Palestinian state could have survived the ambitions of King Abdullah of Jordan is another matter--not with his British-trained and British-officered (!) troops.

art eckstein -
3/6/2011

What Omar writes is untrue. The proto-Israelis accepted the demarcation lines. Husseini could have done the same, but did not. HE and the Palestinians, rather than accepting the demarcation lines, started the war, in Nov. 1947(read Benny Morris, 1948).

They were winning for five months, but then the Israelis won. That's where the 20% expansion comes from: because of the war.

Omar reverses the chronology.
He can't get even the basics of history down right.

He can sure make insults though. I guess they take the place of facts, and are of equal weight to him.

omar ibrahim baker -
3/6/2011

The single mindedness, or rather the blindness, of the Prof is truly amazing that hardly fits a University Professor but is understandable, though not pardonable, in the case of PROFESSOR ECKSTEIN.
His latest enunciation replete with his usual modus operandi of omission and with holding of other pertinent factors to the issue runs as follows:

"they (Hajj Amin Husseini and staff) bear primary responsibility for refusing in 1947 a partition which would've given the Palestinians a state, "

NO where does the Prof mention that his beloved Israel HAD equally , de facto ,REFUSED the partition by invading, occupying and annexing some 20% (+/-) of land BEYOND, ABOVE, its UNGA partition land allocation.
His words , rationale and modus operandi are those of a cheap propagandist; certainly not of a UNIVERSITY PROFESSOR to whom ALL pertinent facts to the issue should be included and weighed in before a conclusion (" which would've given( but did NOT give) the Palestinians a state, " )

Going by the Prof’s logic: HAD the Zionist armed forces NOT occupied any land beyond “Israel’s” UNGA PPR land allocation and confined their domination to Israel’s said land allocation some 48 % (+/-) of Palestine would have remained UNOCCUPIED by the JEWS and would have been the solid foundation of a Palestinian state .
However with an AGGRESSIVE, RACIST and MARAUDING doctrine, Zionism, the only valid and tenable “logic”, as with the logic of colonialism, is the “logic” of conquest, plunder and total denial of others’ rights which is ,in essence, the story of Israel.

omar ibrahim baker -
3/6/2011

After being implicitly rebuked by the editor of HNN for making unfounded allegations as part of his overall deception and fabrication plan ( the "noble" issue") the Prof seems to be more careful with his words but no less eager to deceive, obfuscate and misguide!

His latest:
PALESTINE LAND OWNERSHIP:
" 1. Omar, nothing was stolen. Every piece of land owned by Jews in the Mandate in 1947 was sold to them by willing Arab sellers, often small-holders. " he declaims.
Which is a tautology (the equivalent of: every car I own was bought from a car dealer!) BUT that is totally unrelated to the relevant basic question of : " how much of Palestine did Jews own in 1948"; which is the pertinent question!
The answer to that is, according to British figures, 5.6% (+/-) of the total area of Palestine.
This 5.6% should be juxtapose with the irrefutable facts that :
a- Israel's land allocation according to the UNGA Partition of Palestine was 56% (+/-) of the total area of Palestine
And
b-Israel established itself in 1948 over some 72% (+/-) of the total area of Palestine .
Going by the Prof's own words the inevitable conclusions are:
1-Jews owned only some 10% (5.6/56) of the land allocated to Israel's by the UNGA PPR and the balance of 90% (+/-) was NOT owned by Jews ie was Arab, mainly, and others owned and was stolen from them.
AND
2-Israel was established over a land out of which Jews owned ONLY 7.7% (5.6/72) and over 92.3 % ( 100-7.7=92.3%) Jews did NOT OWN, the balance being stolen from its mainly Arab owners.

THE HAJJ AMIN HUSSEINI NAZI ISSUE:
Here the Prof reiterates the innate allegations of a doctrinaire Nazi Palestinian leadership deliberately ignoring that most basic rules of politics and FACTS of temporary history that the enemy of my enemy is my friend and ally while the battle rages.
The Prof resents the HajjAmin/Germany (then Nazi ruled) relations choosing to forget, ignore and accept that :
a- Israel heartily and willingly accepted a great deal of money and political support from GERMANY, the nation that at one time gave Nazism and Hitler its majority support!
( One would expect from a good father NOT to accept money from the killer of his children!)

b-At one time some 50% (+/-), land and people, of FRANCE had extremely close and friendly relations with NAZI Germany and Hitler (The Vichy regime).
c-At one time all of Italy, under Mussolini, was extremely friendly with and a military ally of Nazi Germany and Hitler.

To the Prof GERMAN/FRENCH/ITALIAN--NAZI/Hitler relations are not ONLY acceptable and understandable as politically motivated BUT are
” pardonable”, being financially and politically EXPLOITABLE , while the much less close Palestinian Leadership-Nazi/Hitler relations are NOT!

Here it is not a question of a DOUBLE standard as much as it is the SINGLE Zionist standard of incessant total immorality, morality less, profitability and the end justifies the means

art eckstein -
3/6/2011

Butler cannot respond with specific counter-evidence to any of the specific facts I presented; all he offers is incoherence and vituperation.

He stands revealed.

P.S. Since the genocidal maniac and friend of Himmler Husseini was the political head of the Palestinians, and his nephew was the military head of the Palestinians, then yes, Butler--they bear primary responsibility for refusing in 1947 a partition which would've given the Palestinians a state, because they opted to drive the proto-Israelis into the sea. So they started a war instead. Though they were winning for five months, they lost.

The nakba was a result of, and took place within, the war they themselves started.
The conquest of the West Bank by Jordan's monarch was a result of, and took place within, the war they started. (Of course, Abdullah wanted a lot more, but he settled for the West Bank.)
The conquest of Gaza by Egypt was a result of, and took place within, the war they started.
Get it?

art eckstein -
3/5/2011

1. Omar, nothing was stolen. Every piece of land owned by Jews in the Mandate in 1947 was sold to them by willing Arab sellers, often small-holders. You remain ignorant on this issue,though I've given you the reference son it.

Then the Jews were attacked (in Nov. 1947). After winning for 5 months, the Arabs eventually lost; as a result of losing the war of aggression they started, instead of accepting the UN Resolution and having their own country as the proto-Israelis did, they lost land. If they hadn't attacked, they wouldn't have lost the land.

They've never stopped whining about losing, though they were the ones who attacked.

2. Husseini himself in his memoirs says he heartily agreed with Hitler about the fate of the Jews:

In his memoirs Husseini wrote :”Our fundamental condition for cooperating with Nazi Germany was a free hand to eradicate every last Jew from Palestine and the Arab world.” Grand Mufti al-Husayni asked Hitler for an explicit undertaking to allow us to solve the Jewish problem in a manner befitting our national and racial aspirations and according to the scientific methods innovated by Germany in the handling of the Jews. The answer Grand Mufti al-Husayni got was, “ The Jews are yours.”

We now know that an SS Einsatzkommando was ready in Athens to fly into Egypt and then the Mandate if Rommel was successful at El Alamein, and begin the slaughter.

In 1943, Husseini says, he already knew from Himmler personally that the Nazis had killed 3 million Jews, in death-factories in Poland. The next year he urged the Bulgarian government to send 5,000 Jewish children to a place where they could be policed...namely Poland.

This is NOT "the enemy of my enemy is my friend", Omar; this is ideological genocidal anti-semitic unity. Husseini planned the same thing in 1948.

3. If you want to think that the conquest and formal inclusion of the West Bank into Jordan (and the conquest and formal inclusion of Gaza into Egypt) was what the Palestinians wished in 1948, and was not simply helpless acquiescence to foreign control, I've got a bridge in Brooklyn to sell you, Omar.

james joseph butler -
3/5/2011

"But this history is too complex for Mr. Butler, I am sure." Well that makes two of us. It's always too complex for us mortals but being a lapsed Christian soldier I feel duty bound to fray the knot.

How Arthur Eckstein can consign the birth of Israel; the Nakba, the Zionists, those hopeful evangelicals, that dream come true, Judea and Samaria, -Peaches and Herb- "Reunited and it feels so good." to a single individual, "The failure of the Palestinian cause in the 1940s can be attributed to this psychopath." the great and powerful Grand Mufti al-Husseini, and in his next breath state that history is complicated may be mysterioso to some but it's just another example of what happens to the "truth" when the algorithm is: Israel is Yahweh's design.

I just read twenty paragraphs on "Zionism"'s Wiki page (I know real intellectuals flush the Wiki before the bilge.) before I encountered Theodore Herzl. Just wondering, AE, did Israel need Mr Herzl?

Oh yeah, the Grand Mufti. AE does it make any difference to the truth, yours that is, that the Grand Mufti was more devoted to Pan-Arabism and Greater Syria with Damascus as its locus until Sykes Pikot, which some folks on this site see as an exemplar of truth justice and the Semitic way, disabused him - France: "Dude, get outta Dodgamascus, or else." - pointed him towards Jerusalem and Yahweh and destiny 1948? Was Mr. al-Husseini more interested in power or Jews? Just curious about the role that imperialistic powers, France and the UK, played in the creation of Yahweh's plan.

Mr. AE, do you believe that "imperialism" and its twin "racism" had a role in the creation of Israel?

omar ibrahim baker -
3/5/2011

Back to wishful thinking and post crime justification that convinces no one including, I suspect, the learned Prof.

Interestingly neither the Prof nor his soul mate, N Friedman, ever dare broach the issue of whether the indigenous people whose land was coveted, totally we believe, partially they contend, was ever consulted about the Zionist "sharing" of his land.

Hajj Amin, may God have mercy on his soul and allow him residence in High Heaven, fought the right battle and searched for allies where ever he could find them.
The allegation that he was a convinced, doctrinaire, Nazi is bellied by the fact that Nazism , fascism in general, not only runs counter to Islam but never had any substantial following in contemporary Arab history; unlike, of course, Racist Zionism.

Back to facts and away from the Prof's innately false reconstruction of history re post Israel, ie post 1948, Palestine in which:

a-he falsely accuses King Abdullah I of Trans Jordan of occupying WHAT the HAGGANAH & Co failed to occupy of Palestine in 1948.
The truth is that the non Zionist occupied part of Palestine ( some 28 % of total area +/-)voluntarily accepted UNION with Trans Jordan at the Jericho Conference!
b-Here the Prof commits the, for a Professor, shameful act of omission and of withholding facts ( he is seemingly unfriendly with the WHOLE Truth) by failing to note that Israel in 1948 occupied some 20% of Palestine BEYOND, ABOVE, its land allocation by the UNGA Partition of Palestine resolution.

Overall I am happy with the recent "tone" of the defenders of Israel.
It used to be a strident " we reoccupied our land (still is with Netanyahu & Co)" now it is much more of a meek beseeching, a pitiful pleads, for understanding based on bogus justification.

Evidently that is a reaction to the universal "awakening" about Zionism and Israel that will eventually culminate in the total de legitimization Of Israel.

art eckstein -
3/5/2011

As for Husseini, his attitude was NOT "the enemy of my enemy is my friend," Butler, like that of the IRA. Husseini AGREED with the genocidal anti-semitism of Hitler. That is, the BASIS of the alliance was ideological affinity, founded in intended genocide of the Jews. Husseini knew and approved of the Holocaust, and intended to institute it in the Middle East if he could. (It's in his memoirs.)

And THIS was the leader of the Palestinians in 1948. Without his influence, perhaps there wouldn't have been a war (which the Palestinians' started, in Nov. 1947; Husseini's nephew was their military leader). And without a war, the Palestinians might have had a state, like the Jews, starting in 1948 (if King Abdullah I of Jordan didn't conquer them with his British-trained and officered forces--which is what actually happened). The failure of the Palestinian cause in the 1940s can be attributed directly to this psychopath.

But this history is too complex for Mr. Butler, I am sure.

Arnold Shcherban -
3/4/2011

Your characterizations are right on the money,... American and Israeli one.

james joseph butler -
3/2/2011

Like Thomas Friedman in the NYT Prof Pipes labors beneath the weight of defending Israel and America and their actions in the ME for the last 50 years as they try to explain the ME today, every sentence needs to be sand blasted to glean something approaching the truth that there has no been no greater enemy of "progress" in the ME than Israel and Uncle Sam.

His absurd notion that Turkey, Syria, Lebanon, Gaza, and Qatar are "hostile" to the West. Turkey wants to a part of the EU. Is that hostile to the West? Qatar will host the World Cup in 2022, has hosted the US military on numerous occasions, Cornell, Georgetown, Texas A&M etc. have opened satellite schools. Lebanon is hostile to Israel, three invasions, maybe more, might explain that, not the West. Visit Beirut Prof Pipes. Syria is hostile to nations that steal its land and bomb its territory. Gaza is hostile to its jailor and his sponsor.

Pipes describes the appeal of al-Husseini, Nasser, Saddam Hussein and the Ayatollah Khomeini, as "rhetoric, rejectionism and backwardness." A reversal of fortune is the common denominator. Al-Husseini didn't like Zionists, one can't imagine why, and allied with Nazis, so did the IRA. Nasser was one of the colonels who overthrew a colonial government and rose to power based on his desire to unite Arabs. What would Prof Pipes know about sympathizing with an effort to unite a downtrodden people?
Hussein was America's SOB until he was our Great Satan. Khomeini was the reason why we needed that SOB. Khomeini came to power thanks to the Shah and the CIA, not "rejectionism" or "backwardness". "Rhetoric"?! - This is a negative?

All four leaders reveled in the role of defenders of the "Homeland". Not that America or Israel would know anything about that.